


To Love Like This Again

by getoffmybarricade



Category: Les Miserables
Genre: Angst, Enjolras Has Feelings, Enjolras Is Bad At Feelings, Fake Dating, Fake/Pretend Relationship, Falling In Love, I know wow, M/M, Slow Burn, Unrequited Love, a bit - Freeform, comedy? In certain parts, ish, more tags will be added, there’s not that much of it this time
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-10-15
Updated: 2020-10-15
Packaged: 2021-03-08 21:02:32
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,055
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27023212
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/getoffmybarricade/pseuds/getoffmybarricade
Summary: Grantaire has been in love with Enjolras since the minute he stumbled into the Cafe Musain in the middle of a meeting.Combeferre has been in love with Enjolras since....well. It depends how long he’s known Enjolras.What happens when both men find out they both have feelings for their fiery leader? What happens if they decide that one of them should be able to date him?
Relationships: Combeferre & Courfeyrac & Enjolras (Les Misérables), Courfeyrac/Jean Prouvaire, Enjolras/Combeferre, Enjolras/Grantaire, Grantaire & Combeferre, Grantaire & Éponine Thénardier, Grantaire/Combeferre
Comments: 2
Kudos: 12





	1. Chapter 1

Grantaire could easily remember the day he first saw Enjolras. 

And that sounds much creepier than it really is but honestly just hear him out. 

~~~~~~~~~~

Four years ago 

To say it was cold would be something of an understatement. 

It was  _freezing_.  And it wasn’t even just that regular, sort of irritating cold, oh no. It was the kind that managed to find the tiniest holes in your clothing and crept its way in through there. The kind that made you want to curl up in a cafe somewhere with a hot chocolate (or a large brandy) and never dream of going outside. 

He was supposed to be meeting Eponine. Key word being ‘ _supposed_ ’  because she most definitely was not here and it was getting colder by the second. He felt a buzz from inside his jacket pocket where he was clutching hold of his phone and removed one hand from the warmth of his pocket and pulled out his phone, wincing at the exposure to the winter weather. He squinted at the message on the screen and tried to ignore the stinging the cold wind sent. 

**Ep:** _sorry R. Couldn’t make it. Gav got sick._  
  
He sighed and swore under his breath. He’d much rather take care of a sick Gavroche then stand there in the cold literally in the middle of nowhere. He looked back down as another message buzzed through.

**Ep** :  _okay, I’m lying. Sorry. It’s too fucking cold._

Goddamn it. He hoped _she_ got sick. 

Deciding that she didn’t deserve a response and could spend the day wondering if he froze to death alone and cold in the middle of Paris, he shoved his phone back into his jacket. That, and the fact his fingers were too numb to coherently type back a message. 

He looked around bitterly for somewhere to sit and his eyes settled on a small cafe a couple hundred of meters away.  _ The Musain.  _

Right. 

He knew there was an activist group with a name vaguely related to the alphabet that held frequent meetings there but he was almost completely sure that was only on Tuesdays and Fridays so he should be okay. 

Plus, he knew it wasn’t Tuesday because he’d had to babysit Gavroche-

(“-It’s not  _babysitting_ ,  R. I’m not a  baby.”)

- on that day. And it couldn’t be Friday because he had to deliver that package to next door before the date of return expired.

So with the newly made up mind that he wouldn’t be bumping into any red-faced revolutionaries any time soon, he marched straight through the door and-

-and on second thoughts, maybe his neighbour wouldn’t be getting that package before the expiration date after all. 

Ah. 

Well he supposed he could always just ignore them. How hard could it be? 

To his credit, he thought that before the leader turned around to face him. 

Now, Grantaire wouldn’t say it was love at first sight. He didn’t believe in any of that kind of stuff-soulmates, destiny, the lot of it. A load of crap. Because that would mean that there was someone out there waiting for him and with the blink of an eye...boom. He’d be in love. Which also then meant that there would be someone out there who would find him even remotely desirable, which with his twenty two years of being on earth he knew to be very false. It wasn’t even like he had a good personality either. 

So, no. Not love at first sight. 

But definitely the most absolutely, jaw-droppingly beautiful man he’d ever seen in his entire life. He wondered vaguely for a moment if perhaps he had died and this was an angel looking at him; smooth skin and golden hair with shockingly bright eyes. The kind, if he had been a poet, he would have written verses and verses about. 

The angel however, or maybe even Apollo, did not seem particularly pleased with the interruption to his meeting that Grantaire had been so sure was not taking place and was fixing him with a very intense glare. To be fair to him, he was just sort of stood there gawking so he could imagine why he might be slightly irritated. 

“Well then?” Apollo said expectantly, pursing his lips and sighing heavily. 

“Um,” Grantaire said lamely, “sorry?” 

Apollo rolled his eyes. 

“Are you sitting down or not?” 

_ No  _ would have been the correct answer.  _No I am sitting over there by myself with a hot drink._

“Yeah,” was what he said instead, stumbling over to a table next to a guy with long, red hair. 

“What’s your name?” He blurted out before he could stop himself. Apollo fixed him with one last burning glare and carried right on with his speech, forgetting all about Grantaire sat there. 

“His name is Enjolras.” The red-head said quietly when no one was looking. 

_Enjolras_. 

Fuck. He was screwed. 

And from the look the guy next to him was giving him, he obviously knew that too. 

~~~~~~~~~~~

At first he’d accepted the fact that he would never see any of these people again and that even if he embarrassed himself beyond belief by asking Enjolras out, it would have no long lasting effects. 

He’d get a simple ‘no’ and then he would leave. 

However, as time creeped on he realised he didn’t want to see the last of Les Amis De L’ABC. 

And so four years later Grantairead absolutely no intention of telling Enjolras any of this. Ever. 

He was aware that he was quite vocal about his...feelings...towards him but somehow it had seemed to go right over his head. The same could not be said for the rest of the ABC, who Grantaire had grown steadily very accustomed to, and they found it quite enjoyable to relentlessly tease him about this. 

He didn’t really mind, and he knew that if he asked them to stop then they would, but over the course of the four years since he’d stumbled into that cafe, they’d become his closest friends. 

No, really. He could barely remember life before meeting these people and well-

-no. Well. He  _ could _ , it just wasn’t....it wasn’t very enjoyable before then. He had Eponine of course, and he still did, whether or not she found his crush on Enjolras hilarious or ridiculous he wasn’t too sure but he also wasn’t particularly worried that she’d make fun of him. 

So, all in all, it was pretty great. 

Unless, of course, you counted the fact that he was head-over-heels, spectacularly, embarrassingly in love with Enjolras who barely even put up with the mere mention of him. 

Just perfect. 


	2. Chapter 2

Combeferre can’t pin-point the exact date he met Enjolras. 

Or the exact year, to be completely honest. 

He’d known Enjolras pretty much his entire life, meeting when he was probably around five or six and Enj a year younger. 

He knew it was around the time he was being bullied by a group of kids in his year even though, and still to this day, he had no idea what he did wrong. They were cornering him once at recess, pushed up against the splintery fence of the playground and then this blonde, angry-looking kid a grade below him stormed over, successfully sucker punching the tallest bully in the face. 

He’d been left alone after that. 

But the point was; since then they’d become inseparable. It wasn’t even something they’d really noticed until they were nearing the end of high school and still had a bond stronger than almost anyone he knew. 

No, literally. 

It dawned on them when Combeferre’s parents wished them a happy thirteen year anniversary. And as it turned out, most people they knew were absolutely convinced the two were dating which was completely ridiculous since Combeferre did  _not_ ,  under no circumstances have even the teeniest crush on Enjolras, and Enjolras obviously felt exactly the same. 

_Keep telling yourself that_ ,  he’d thought that night. They’d been watching a movie and Enjolras had fallen asleep with his head on Combeferre’s shoulder, the smell of his strawberry shampoo strong in his nose.  _Keep pretending you don’t like him_. 

His parents were basically Enjolras’s parents and Combeferre knew it would have been the same for him too if Enjolras’s parents hadn’t been such assholes. Homophobic, mentally and physically abusive assholes, that was. So most of the time they hung out at Ferre’s and listened to music or ranted about the injustices in this school. Something else, he realised, they’d also never grown out of. 

Which was good, obviously, since somebody needed to try and do something and les Amis de L’ABC was just the group to do it. 

They met Courfeyrac a couple of years after the bullying incident when he transferred schools from Càriz, Spain and one day decided to latch himself onto the duo. He was in Enjolras’s grade and as soon as Courf flashed them they dazzling smile he couldn’t even dream of turning him down. 

He remembered one year he’d been sure that Courfeyrac had a crush on Enjolras and he was filled with a strange, intense sort of dislike for the brown haired boy until the crush had passed over and Courfeyrac started talking about other people in the school instead. Later, Courf had confirmed he did have a phase of liking Enjolras and although Combeferre knew it no longer applied he still couldn’t help feeling that little bit wary. 

Of course that was when he had been first forced into considering the possibility that  he  was now the one with a crush on Enjolras. 

And at first he’d heavily denied it-because Enj was his  _ friend _ , of course-and the thought of having to ever express anything other than platonically terrified him. 

The next stage was when he decided that the only available option was to avoid Enjolras at all costs. He would sit with someone else at lunch and cancel plans, all the while fully aware this was doing nothing to soften the aching blow. Of course, fifteen-year-old Combeferre probably wasn’t the most...emotionally connected person. So in his defence he really didn’t know better. 

When he finally accepted the fact that  yes,  he did have feelings for Enjolras, he assumed that now he had confronted them they would just go away. 

(They hadn’t. At all) 

However over time he realised that this wasn’t going to work and simply gave in, pretending that living with those feelings was normal and that one day they would disappear. 

But honestly, who could blame him? Enjolras was ridiculously beautiful: soft, brown skin and stupidly intelligent eyes. A smile that was so rare when he was in public but saved so specially for his friends when they were together. And Combeferre was no artist. Nor was he a poet or a writer otherwise he could have sat for hours to try and captivate that beauty. But alas, he could do none of those things. 

The biggest problem currently was that Grantaire was very obviously in love with Enjolras. At first, this hadn’t worried him because the blonde had very clearly despised the man. But then his rants about Grantaire increased and he became the topic of so many conversations when it was just him, Courfeyrac and Enjolras together. And although Combeferre liked Grantaire thoroughly and didn’t have a bad word to put against him, it filled him with a strange sense of satisfaction to know that Enjolras was safely out of his way. 

No need for worrying. 

Now, however, there was very much need for worrying since as his love for Enjolras grew stronger, unfortunately so did Grantaire’s. 

But Combeferre was the level headed one of the group; the one who kept everyone in check. It was slightly tiresome, sure, but he was  not  having a repeat of the week he went away and returned to a broken leg from Bossuet, Bahorel’s right eye swollen, a large sum of smashed cutlery and somehow Courfeyrac stuck on a roof with a bag of frozen peas. No one really knew how he got up there, himself included, but he was quite happy to watch out for his friends (who at this point were just overgrown school kids) if it meant keeping them safe. Literally from theirselves. He couldn’t afford to be in love. 

Especially not with their leader. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Okay so   
> Neither of these first two chapters were particularly long (especially this one) but they were mainly just introductions   
> They will be longer from now on and the actual plot will begin but thank you for reading so far :)
> 
> If you enjoyed PLEASE drop a comment :) I love them 
> 
> Thanks <3

**Author's Note:**

> This is going to be multi-chaptered even though I’m not *entirely* sure where I’m going with this  
> Anyway  
> Thank you :)


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